Open the attached file entitled “Theatre Reader Challenge.” There you will find a list of 52 plays. Choose one of these plays to read and write a 500-word (minimum) summary and response.
Details
When deciding which play to read, it might be wise to do a bit of research so that you know something about the play (genre, time period, etc.) before you devote much time to it. Please note that some plays may contain mature content, but that each of these plays is considered to have high literary merit among the theatre community.
Write a 500-word essay, detailing the plot, major characters, and central themes of your chosen play. Part of this essay should include your response to the play; quite simply, did you enjoy reading the play? Why or why not? Please make sure that your essay is written in MLA format with appropriate citations (if needed), using appropriate grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
To be a good actor/director/teacher/person is to be a good reader. Read one play
a week for a year and watch how your craft develops. Seriously.
Can you read 1 play every week? Here’s the list:
1. Our Town by Thornton Wilder
2. A Raisin in The Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
3. Hamlet by William Shakespeare
4. The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
5. Noises Off by Michael Frayn
6. The History Boys by Alan Bennett
7. Doubt by John Patrick Shanley
8. Antigone by Sophocles
9. The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams
10. The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov
11. Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
12. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
13. The Miracle Worker by William Gibson
14. A Doll’s House by Henric Ibsen
15. A Midsummer’s Night Dream by William Shakespeare
16. Arcadia by Tom Stoppard
17. Uncommon Women and Others by Wendy Wasserstein
18. Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lorie Parks
19. How I Learned to Drive by Paula Vogel
20. ‘night Mother by Marsha Norman
21. The Shape of Things by Neil LaBute
22. A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
23. The Crucible by Arthur Miller
24. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead by Tom Stoppard
25. Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes by Tony Kushner
26. for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf by Ntozake
Shange
27. Glengarry Glen Ross by David Mamet
28. Picnic by William Inge
29. The Iceman Cometh by Eugene O’Neil
30. No Exit by Jean-Paul Satre
31. Proof by David Auburn
32. Pygmailion by George Bernard Shaw
33. Hedda Gabler by Henrik Ibsen
http://www.theaterish.com/new-blog/2014/11/20/1-year-of-plays
34. The Pillowman by Martin McDonagh
35. Tartuffe by Molière
36. The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman
37. The Bald Soprano by Eugène Ionesco
38. The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht
39. Long Day’s Journey into Night by Eugene O’Neil
40. Fences by August Wilson
41. August: Osage County by Tracy Letts
42. True West by Sam Shepard
43. The Homecoming by Harold Pinter
44. Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare
45. Present Laughter by Noel Coward
46. Machinal by Sophie Treadwell
47. M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang
48. The Odd Couple by Neil Simon
49. Top Girls by Caryl Churchill
50. Tea and Sympathy by Robert Anderson
51. The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie
52. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe? by Edward Albee
*list taken from www.theaterish.com/new-blog/2014/11/20/1-year-of-plays
http://www.theaterish.com/new-blog/2014/11/20/1-year-of-plays